Learning and inquiry › Finding an Answer You Do Not Yet Know

Imagine teaching someone to double the area of a square. They confidently double its side, then discover that their new square has four times the original area. They can recognize a mistake without already knowing the solution. But what will let them recognize the right answer when it arrives? How much must a learner know before inquiry can begin?

Plato's Meno turns this difficulty into a challenge to inquiry itself. Socrates answers with recollection: learning recovers knowledge already present in the soul. The dialogue then complicates its own demonstration by distinguishing a correct answer from understanding why it is correct. Following that distinction takes us back to the question that started the conversation: can anyone teach another person to be good?